Never Let Go
by elfmaiden4legs
Summary: In the season finale to Season 4 Jack discovers that the Darlek's are about to invade earth... knowing that there is nothing he can do, and traumatised by memories of Satalite Five all those years ago, this is my take on how he may react!


**Never Let Go**

**_Hiya all, yes I know it's been a while... again, but this is just another little one-shot of mine! This cam to me whilst watching the final 2 episodes of DW Season 4, and was just begging to be written, and so here it is! Please don't forget to REVIEW! Enjoy! :D_**

"Jack… Jack, can you hear me?"

"Sir… Jack, what are we going to do?"

Gwen and Ianto stood, looking at their Captain, eyes fixed empty and blank, far away,,, expression full of fear. From the moment he had heard the transmission he had spoken something about there being nothing he could do… they were all dead, and it was immediately obvious to them both that Captain Jack was a broken man.

Pale and distraught, the man who could not die, the man they had believed in even when all else appeared lost and hopeless was paralysed… haunted by his own troubled, and complex past.

It was at this point that he had planted a second affectionate kiss upon both of their foreheads, clammy with cold sweat, before making his way back to his office, on the second floor of the Hub, and closing the door tightly behind him… and it was here that they now found him.

Sitting at his desk, staring into space, his head resting upon his interlocked fingers, expression distant and cheeks stained with tears… he smiled gravely as they entered.

"Jack?" Gwen spoke cautiously as she approached, voice broken with evident fear and suppressed emotion.

"Sir, tell us, what are those things?" Ianto asked.

Both studied Jack's reaction with this, his eyes immediately focused on them, their voices drawing his attention in their direction as both seated themselves on the opposite side of his desk, parallel with their Captain, although unseeing, as he continued to stare straight through them, beyond them, at a scene they could neither see nor hear, bearing witness to only through the evidence of Jack's haunted expression.

So little was known to the Torchwood team about Captain Jack Harkness, except for the brief glimpses they gained of a past he spoke of little and not very often… but Gwen immediately understood, and, first t speak, in the empathetic, reassuring tone of hers, as always, reached out to Jack, taking him by the hand and squeezing it within her own icy grasp before continuing.

"You've encountered these before." She observed, and Jack nodded, locking eyes with his two colleagues at this as though noticing their presence for the first time.

"I'm sorry." He echoed his apology of earlier. "There's nothing I can do."

"What happened?" Gwen asked. Ianto remained silent, knowing what his Captain needed now was time to compose himself enough to explain to them exactly what they were up against and what it was they now needed to do.

Under any other circumstances Ianto would have been serving up the team's coffee by now, as he had done before every other board meeting since Jack had first enlisted him to Torchwood, although it had dawned on him that that this was not turning out to be an average day even for Torchwood, nor was it the right time for even his special blend of the rich, aromatic beverage.

Toshiko and Owen were gone – not that Owen had had much of a call for coffee during the final few months of what he had liked to call living death – leaving only himself and Gwen now, as well as Jack of course, but looking at his Captain now he evidently had more pressing issues on his mind than whether his next coffee break would be on time, and, if he was honest, a terrified Ianto wanted to know exactly what threat they now found themselves up against… and if it was enough to scare Jack into this kind of a state, firstly he _must_ have come across them before, and secondly, they must be bad even by Torchwood's standards.

Captain Jack was never afraid, or of he was he never showed it… until now.

Jack turned to face Gwen first. "You remember on the day I recruited you," he spoke. "I told you something…." He explained. "I told you I cannot die."

She nodded.

"I told you something else." He continued. "I died, in another time, another place, a million light years from here… I was killed… and then I was brought back."

Gwen and Ianto listened intently to Jack's words, he'd never before revealed to them so much about his past.

"They killed me." He continued after a moment, "and that would have been the end had Rose not brought me back.

I'd been travelling with The Doctor." He explained in response to his two colleagues enquiring looks with this.

"The Doctor… your Doctor?" It was Ianto's turn to ask the questions now.

"My Doctor." Jack nodded with a watery smile. "Rose was like me, another of his companions… she saved my life.

They're called Dalek's," He revealed finally, "and after I came too, alone and abandoned in the middle of a post-war zone, I hoped I'd never have to face them again."

"But they're alien." Gwen observed after a moment. "And we're Torchwood, it's our duty to find a way to defeat these things"

"You don't defeat the Dalek's!" Jack snapped. "They're full of pure rage, and greed, and hatred, not even Torchwood can compete with that… if The Doctor couldn't… I was defenceless, by that stage anyway, bullets had been no good. I was no threat to them, but they killed me anyway.

I'm sorry… I've let you down."

"No." Gwen smiled.

"I should be able to save you." Jack spoke. "I couldn't save Tosh and Owen… I can't save you!"

"One thing you've always taught us Jack," Gwen explained, "is to never give up, never stop fighting. Tosh and Owen went down fighting, they never gave up, and nether will we! For them! Are you really going to give up now Jack?"

Jack looked at her and Ianto in turn. He smiled, the genuine expression of characteristic charm, before rising from his desk and making his way to the door. He stood there in silence for a few moments.

"There's got to be something we can do!" Ianto sighed.

"You're right!" Jack spoke at last, turning back to face them with a weak, if nothing short of genuine smile. "There may be nothing we can do… but we're not giving up! For Tosh and Owen." He winked.

"For Tosh and Owen." Gwen and Ianto smiled, and with this they followed their Captain back downstairs to the epicentre of the Hub, knowing that Jack had been hurt… that it was going to take more than words to heal the wounds that had been created years previous… but that equally Captain Jack was not going to go down without a fight, and neither, if they could help it, were they.

**END!**


End file.
